Grieve Weave  1 -  22

This series of artist’s books integrates ghost prints into a unified book structure where the woven image hovers in an abstract, hard-to-decipher place. The works can be titled, flipped, opened, re-hung, or re-positioned in multiple directions, and that no focal point or "correct" orientation exists in the work itself. What happens when a text, image, or book is seductive but difficult to read? Abstraction in the book form defies easy reading; as queer art historian David Getsy writes, “queer abstraction” can act as a form of camouflage, non-disclosure, or method for jamming the surveillance of queer bodies. Navigating queer and transness over two decades of political change, I’m ever more convinced it cannot be entirely understood or legitimized through representation and public visibility. Grieve Weave accesses what is felt or sensed but not entirely visible. A weaving cannot be read as a traditional book, and yet it has deep historical connections to text and today's information technologies. Weaving is a form of ancestral knowledge and a companion in the contemplation of grief. The series is not explicitly about identity, but instead about creating book objects that hover alongside it.

Selected images
Grieve Weave 9 (overlapping grief weave) / Bauhaus wallpaper Ouija tea set, 2023, Artists' book: monoprint on coventry rag and somerset, asahi silk and iris rayon bookcloth.

Grieve Weave 13 (radiating kindness weave) / Bauhaus wallpaper Ouija clutch, 2023, Artists' book: monoprint on woven Somerset paper, Asahi mohair and Iris rayon bookcloth.

Grieve Weave 15 (Clarice Lispector weave) / Bauhaus wallpaper Ouija passport holder, 2024, Artists' book: monoprint and etching on somerset and pescia, letterpress on mohawk superfine, asahi silk bookcloth.

Two fold is a wall-mounted accordion book that consists of 84 cut-paper panels. A collaboration between Anthea Black and Thea Yabut, Two fold begins with their ongoing "mirror drawing" studio game, and their practice of using scissors and knives as a drawing tool. Working from the centre and cutting outwards, the pair creates a third inner space that exists at the meeting point between two pages, echoing Homi Bhabha's idea of the third space as an iterative, continuously expanding code.

The accordion book binding method and installation, devised by Anthea Black, allows each page to hover seamlessly on the gallery wall.

Images
Two Fold: twice as great or as numerous, Anthea Black and Thea Yabut, Binding by Anthea Black, Cut Somerset book paper, 2016-2017.